a more interesting series of questions is why does cuch avoid all contact with women, why Scotty's first impulse is to spend his Christmas money on blackjack than a romantic evening with his new wife, and if it was Avalon's mom who pinched my ass on the train last week.

Yokohama, Japan - When Yumuiko Mutsu rushes to the crowded subway station each morning for her 45-minute commute to downtown Tokyo, she finds herself presented with a new option: a cramped subway car without a single man inside.

"This is great," said Mutsu, 23, who works for a TV station. "It has been very stressful to have men so close every morning. I love it."

In early May, seven private railways and two subway operators in the Tokyo area decided to introduce women-only cars in order to cut down on the number of groping incidents on crowded trains.

According to the Metropolitan Police Department, the number of cases involving groping or obscene conduct rose from 778 in 1996 to 2,201 in 2004. The department also reported that more than 50 percent of groping cases took place between 7 and 9 a.m., during the morning commute.

A police spokesman said groping has been a problem for many years, but that the number of arrests have gone up because these days most young women carry cell phones capable of sending e-mail and taking pictures, and they're using them to report offenses.

Cars just for women are usually at the front or end of trains, marked with pink plastic seals on their windows and pink signs on the platforms where the cars stop. Women all over the Tokyo suburbs dash to board them.

Some men, however, are protesting.

In the western city of Osaka, which got Japan's first commuter cars for women in 2002, Takahito Yamao started an organization to oppose women-only train cars. The group has 46 members.

"This system is discriminating against men," he said. "We pay the same fare and yet are labeled as evil persons. Not all men are gropers. This is insulting."

On May 22, 20 members of his group gathered in Osaka and 13 in Tokyo to discuss how to persuade train operators to get rid of the women-only cars.

Yamao said that excluding men from some cars won't eradicate the problem of molesters on trains.

The cars are only for women during key commute times, but trains are packed at other times as well.

The organization has sent letters to train companies suggesting that they set up security cameras inside each car, increase the number of guards on platforms and give discounts on off-peak tickets.

Instead, Yamao said, they resorted to the women-only cars, something he sees as a cheap stunt.

"This is just propaganda to show off, as if they are tackling the issue and trying to protect women from gropers. But it hardly costs anything and only involves putting pink seals on the windows and platform."

Cooperation is voluntary. Men can't be punished for boarding the pink-bordered cars, rail officials said.

Some members of Yamao's group take the women-only cars in protest.

To do that, they have to ignore polite requests.

When commuters converge on the Tama Plaza station in Yokohama for their daily dose of sardine-packed bedlam known as morning rush hour, they find a security guard from the Rising Sun Security company holding a placard and repeatedly offering a gentle reminder:

"Good morning. Please be aware that the last car will be for women only. Thank you for your cooperation."

The guard maintains his vigil at this station, just west of Tokyo, from the first train's departure at 5:17 a.m. until 9:30 a.m., when the rush of commuters ebbs.

Most men seem resigned to the new system, though some fear that they could be falsely accused of groping. They also worry that the regular cars will be even more cramped.

"I don't like it," said Hirasawa Tomoaki, 37, who was reading a newspaper while waiting for a train. "Now the car next to women-only is packed. Also, with all those vivid pink stickers, even after 9:30 a.m. when I am allowed to be on it, I don't feel like getting on that women-only car."

The system doesn't please all women, either.

The rules say that elementary school boys can ride on the cars, but that junior high school boys shouldn't. Yamao said he got a letter from one woman who complained that her son would not be able to take the same car with her.

Akiyo Minagi, 32, said she always used to board the next-to-last car on her way to work. Now that the last car is designated for women only, men seem to stare at her when she boards the mixed car as if to ask, "Why are you here?"

But others say the cars have made their commutes better.

Said Megumi Kanou, a woman who works for a foreign chemical company: "I don't have to suffer from the smell of liquor, cigarette smoke or the barbecue dinner which the guy standing next to me had the night before."

And Kumiko Nakajima, 45, a magazine editor, said she doesn't have to be patient anymore with the kind of man who puts pomade on his hair, sleeps leaning on her shoulder and snores.

judik wrote:Wow .In the most populated city in the world a whole 13 people came together to protest?Outstanding!!!!!

Not surprising at all. Japanese almost never protest anything, no matter how much it might benefit them. The era of mass demonstrations and popular political movements over here has been dead since the late 1960s. Japan's probably the most politically and socially apathetic culture on the planet - everything is left to the authorities to decide.

But much of that was just a protest vote meant to punish the LDP. A lot of the people I've talked to have pretty serious reservations about the DPJ as well (seeing how many of them are ex-LDP), but if you ask them what should be done about the system? しょうがない - 'it can't be helped'.

In over six years in Japan, I've seen one protest rally - a rather paltry and poorly attended anti-war demonstration around the start of the Iraq War.

Hmm... An arguably creepy post about females who come from a different culture... Seems like Pez just threw a fit at another poster for a similar 'offense'. Are the Japanese just not brown and exotic enough to warrant the extra protection Pez?

Oh well, If nothing else, this OP serves to demonstrate why such extreme measures are apparently needed in Japan.

Korky wrote:i remember being on Samothraki island is 2003 and apologizing for being an American under Bush II.

Perish the thought. I was just hoping that I'd eventually get the listing of which cultures needed to be patronized and who needs to be protected the most. I'm afraid I'm not liberal enough to instinctively realize which people from which cultures need to be treated differently and condescended to more than white/Western peoples.

Korky wrote:i remember being on Samothraki island is 2003 and apologizing for being an American under Bush II.

Sweeeeet Pussy Train? Sweeeeet Pusy Train? This is new to me. Is it on the Yamanote loop? If so get off at the Yurakucho stop. Walk back towards the Ginza-Itchome station on the Yurakucho line . Go left at the first street. There is a pinku saron called Poon. They can assist you there.

coffeeguy wrote:Godjira, got a quest for you. Dress up as Sailor Moon, take a ride on the P-train and report back to us on how it went.

strange you should say that, but a few weeks ago I saw a guy wearing a girl's school uniform on the train. I mean, aside from being somewhat feminine naturally- really slim, hairless legs- and fairly young, about 20 years old maybe- he made no real attempt to hide his true gender- an Adam's apple bigger than his head, big ham hands, no makeup, rigid male face, boobless...

I assure you, though, if he did go onto the all woman's train, no one would approach him. As it was, there was a meter wide circle around him on the crowded train.

The thing is, Japan is famous for conformity, uniform behavior, going with the flow... but sometimes the collection of oddball characters you find here are like no place else in the world- and I can remember NYC in the 70's.

coffeeguy wrote:Godjira, got a quest for you. Dress up as Sailor Moon, take a ride on the P-train and report back to us on how it went.

strange you should say that, but a few weeks ago I saw a guy wearing a girl's school uniform on the train. I mean, aside from being somewhat feminine naturally- really slim, hairless legs- and fairly young, about 20 years old maybe- he made no real attempt to hide his true gender- an Adam's apple bigger than his head, big ham hands, no makeup, rigid male face, boobless...

Godjira wrote:a few weeks ago I saw a guy wearing a girl's school uniform on the train. I mean, aside from being somewhat feminine naturally- really slim, hairless legs- and fairly young, about 20 years old maybe- he made no real attempt to hide his true gender- an Adam's apple bigger than his head, big ham hands, no makeup, rigid male face, boobless...

I assure you, though, if he did go onto the all woman's train, no one would approach him. As it was, there was a meter wide circle around him on the crowded train.

The thing is, Japan is famous for conformity, uniform behavior, going with the flow... but sometimes the collection of oddball characters you find here are like no place else in the world- and I can remember NYC in the 70's.

Godjira wrote:a few weeks ago I saw a guy wearing a girl's school uniform on the train. I mean, aside from being somewhat feminine naturally- really slim, hairless legs- and fairly young, about 20 years old maybe- he made no real attempt to hide his true gender- an Adam's apple bigger than his head, big ham hands, no makeup, rigid male face, boobless...

I assure you, though, if he did go onto the all woman's train, no one would approach him. As it was, there was a meter wide circle around him on the crowded train.

The thing is, Japan is famous for conformity, uniform behavior, going with the flow... but sometimes the collection of oddball characters you find here are like no place else in the world- and I can remember NYC in the 70's.

What about that japanese voyeur porn where 2 people shag in a supermarket and people just stand by them ignoring them and looking at the stuff on the shelves, making their choices - is that stuff for real or is it staged?

Hmm, I don't know if it's for real or not. Could be a combination of things- maybe real customers set up with shop owners.... The only thing is that it surely is illegal and I can't imagine anyone taking such a risk of getting involved in the Japanese justice system (where they can detain you without charge for 30 days, and will often detain people who are arrested for 30 days before charging them...)

Pussy train just is not right, we need to keep the sweeet attached, lets not be lazy here and I know that this will pop out of my mouth in real life - there will be no use in trying to explain it, I'll just have to take the creep stink as my own and wear it proudly

it makes me think of Drug Train by the Cramps, perhaps a re-make is in order